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IRS = 
Defund the IRS!
It'll never happen ....... because the damned IRS is the funding mechanism for Obamacare ....... 
Micah 6:8; He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
John 14:19 Jesus said: Because I live, you also will live.
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IRS =
Defund the IRS!
It'll never happen ....... because the damned IRS is the funding mechanism for Obamacare .......
Begin self-check on Sarcasm meter....
... Status: Broken.
Browns is the Browns
... there goes Joe Thomas, the best there ever was in this game.
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Yeah, my comment was more sarcasm meeting cold hard reality.
Micah 6:8; He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
John 14:19 Jesus said: Because I live, you also will live.
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Just clicking
This falls under the heading of FWIW. to those that hate Obama, this will get laughed at, to those that support him, they will say, see, he didn't have any thing to do with it.
Take your pick
Or people will read/hear what he says and compare that to his stance on Benghazi...and conclude that they can't believe a word he says if there is any chance that he might look bad from it.
Nixon lost all credibility through Watergate. Obama's transgression in Benghazi makes Watergate look like a typo.
Like I said
#GMSTRONG
“Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.”
Daniel Patrick Moynahan
"Alternative facts hurt us all. Think before you blindly believe."
Damanshot
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NRTU - Just thought that maybe PDR could change his profile picture. I would recommend this. 
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That seriously creeps me out!
Browns is the Browns
... there goes Joe Thomas, the best there ever was in this game.
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It's really ironic since Nixon is the reason we have established "-gate" as a suffix which means scandal... we now have Benghazigate and IRSgate...
yebat' Putin
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For a guy that likes to constantly remind the board he's ignoring me, you sure do seem to talk about me a lot. 
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Yes it is creepy.
But it does seem to blend better than the Bush pic.
#GMSTRONG
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That seriously creeps me out!
So, you're saying that it's perfect for PDR then? 
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Barack Obama calls IRS focus on conservative groups 'outrageous,' says people 'properly concerned'
Somehow,I don't believe him.
It's outrageous now that it is public.
If everybody had like minds, we would never learn. GM Strong ![[Linked Image]](http://www.dawgtalkers.net/uploads/small-gator-chomp.gif)
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Barack Obama calls IRS focus on conservative groups 'outrageous,' says people 'properly concerned'
Somehow,I don't believe him.
It's outrageous now that it is public.
In other news, the hammer has been hammered by the IRS.
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No....never...I make it a point to keep it inside $1500 either way.
If everybody had like minds, we would never learn. GM Strong
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I know you got your pitch forks out, but before you light those torches let's remember; IRS targeted church for speaking out against White House two days before the president's reelection Karl Rove speaking on Fox Monday morning about what would have happened if the IRS had targeted liberals for scrutiny during the Bush administration: We'd have every major liberal newspaper in America calling for investigation ending in impeachment. It'd be leading the evening news. We'd have have every group that had liberal or progressive tendencies demanding answers and marching on the White House. And leaders of Congress, Democrats in Congress, demanding to have answers. It'd be a nightmare at the Bush White House had this been done on our watch. Poor Republicans. Always the victim of hypocritical liberals. Except: Stepping up its probe of allegedly improper campaigning by churches, the Internal Revenue Service on Friday ordered a liberal Pasadena parish to turn over all the documents and e-mails it produced during the 2004 election year with references to political candidates. All Saints Episcopal Church and its rector, the Rev. Ed Bacon, have until Sept. 29 to present the sermons, newsletters and electronic communications. The IRS investigation was triggered by an antiwar sermon delivered by its former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, at the church two days before the 2004 presidential election. The summons even requests utility bills to establish costs associated with hosting Regas' speech. Bacon was ordered to testify before IRS officials Oct. 11. Maybe it's just me, but somehow I'm forgetting the part about where George W. Bush got impeached because the IRS investigated liberals under his watch. That doesn't mean we should ignore what happened under President Obama, but Rove's baseless hyperventilating is a reminder to keep things in perspective. Of course, with Darrell Issa in charge of the House Government Oversight committee, fat chance of that happening. 
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No....never...I make it a point to keep it inside $1500 either way.
So, you file a standard return?
I've had to itemize or the past two years.
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Just clicking
This falls under the heading of FWIW. to those that hate Obama, this will get laughed at, to those that support him, they will say, see, he didn't have any thing to do with it.
Take your pick
Or people will read/hear what he says and compare that to his stance on Benghazi...and conclude that they can't believe a word he says if there is any chance that he might look bad from it.
Nixon lost all credibility through Watergate. Obama's transgression in Benghazi makes Watergate look like a typo.
Like I said
Like you said? Are you kidding?
Your take and mine could not possibly be more different.
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It wasn't just some local IRS goons in Cincy, but IRS officials in DC that targeted political opponents of the president. WaPo: IRS officials in Washington were involved in investigation of conservative groupsBy Juliet Eilperin and Zachary A. Goldfarb, Updated: Monday, May 13, 8:09 PM Internal Revenue Service officials in Washington and at least two other offices were involved in the targeting of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status, making clear that the effort reached well beyond the branch in Cincinnati that was initially blamed, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post. IRS officials at the agency’s Washington headquarters sent queries to conservative groups asking about their donors and other aspects of their operations, while officials in the El Monte and Laguna Niguel offices in California sent similar questionnaires to tea-party-affiliated groups, the documents show. IRS employees in Cincinnati told conservatives seeking the status of “social welfare” groups that a task force in Washington was overseeing their applications, according to interviews with the activists. Lois G. Lerner, who oversees tax-exempt groups for the IRS, told reporters Friday that the “absolutely inappropriate” actions were undertaken by “front-line people” working in Cincinnati to target groups with “tea party,” “patriot” or “9/12” in their names. In one instance, however, Ron Bell, an IRS employee, informed a lawyer representing a conservative group focused on voter fraud that the application was under review in Washington. On several other occasions, IRS officials in Washington and California sent conservative groups detailed questionnaires about their voter outreach and other activities, according to the documents. “For the IRS to say it was some low-level group in Cincinnati is simply false,” said Cleta Mitchell, a partner in the law firm Foley & Lardner LLP who sought to communicate with IRS headquarters about the delay in granting tax-exempt status to True the Vote. Moreover, details of the IRS’s efforts to target conservative groups reached the highest levels of the agency in May 2012, far earlier than has been disclosed, according to Republican congressional aides briefed by the IRS and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) on the details of their reviews. Then-Ccommissioner Douglas Shulman, a George W. Bush appointee who stepped down in November, received a briefing from the TIGTA about what was happening in the Cincinnati office in May 2012, the aides said. His deputy and the agency’s current acting commissioner, Steven T. Miller, also learned about the matter that month, the aides said. The officials did not share details with Republican lawmakers who had been demanding to know whether the IRS was targeting conservative groups, Republicans said. “I wrote to the IRS three times last year after hearing concerns that conservative groups were being targeted,” Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (Utah), the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, said in a statement Monday. “In response to the first letter I sent with some of my colleagues, Steven Miller, the current Acting IRS Commissioner, responded that these groups weren’t being targeted.” “Knowing what we know now,” he added, “the IRS was at best being far from forth coming, or at worst, being deliberately dishonest with Congress.” As new details emerged Monday, Democrats and Republicans alike decried the agency’s actions as an unacceptable abuse of power. In a news conference Monday, Obama said he learned of it in media reports on Friday and has “no patience with it.” “If in fact IRS personnel engaged in the kind of practices that have been reported on, and were intentionally targeting conservative groups, then that’s outrageous,” Obama said. “And there’s no place for it. And they have to be held fully accountable.” White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters Monday that the White House counsel’s office learned of an upcoming IRS inspector general’s report on April 22 as part of a routine notification but had not received access to the report. On Capitol Hill, two Senate panels — the Finance Committee and the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations — announced Monday that they will investigate. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the Ways and Means Committee have been looking into IRS attempts to single out organizations on the right for heightened scrutiny. Ways and Means has called IRS officials to testify Friday. “These actions by the IRS are an outrageous abuse of power and a breach of the public’s trust,” said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.). “The IRS will now be the ones put under additional scrutiny.” Separately, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio) introduced companion bills Monday that would require the IRS to fire any employee found “willfully” violating “the constitutional rights of a taxpayer,” according to statements by both lawmakers. The bills also would make them criminally liable for their actions. Even as Obama vowed that his administration “will make sure that we find out exactly what happened on this,” however, the IRS offered no new information on how it selected which groups to single out for scrutiny. The White House is legally prohibited from contacting the IRS about a tax matter, under a prohibition adopted after the Watergate scandal. And although it can contact the Treasury Department about tax issues, neither Treasury nor the IRS can disclose specific taxpayer information. The IRS can release information only about a petition for tax- exempt status once it has been approved. Obama is not in a position to remove Lerner, a career official who can be terminated for cause only under normal civil service proceedings. The IRS has two political appointees: the commissioner, who serves a five-year term, and the chief counsel. As the IRS came under broader political attack Monday, more details surfaced on how the exempt-organizations division struggled to determine which nonprofits should receive “social welfare” status after the 2010 Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling. That decision, which allowed corporations and unions to raise and spend unlimited amounts of money on elections, opened the door for groups to accept undisclosed contributions as long as their “primary purpose” was not politics. In a Jan. 9, 2012, letter to the Richmond Tea Party, IRS specialist Stephen Seok asked questions including “the names of the donors, contributors and grantors,” as well as the size of the contributions and grants, and when they were given. Richmond Tea Party President Larry Nordvig, whose group applied for tax-exempt status in December 2009 and received it in July 2012, said the extended inquiry had “a very chilling effect” on how much money the group could raise because its donors preferred anonymity. The Wetumpka Tea Party of Alabama experienced a two-year delay after submitting its initial application. Becky Gerritson, a 44-year-old stay-at-home mother and the group’s president, said the IRS sent a questionnaire asking for the names of all volunteers, donor identification and contribution amounts, the names of any legislators its members had communicated with directly or indirectly, and the contents of all speeches its members had made, among a long list of other details. “I was outraged,” Gerritson said. “Being an election year, I felt like it was intimidation.” The group did not provide the information. Approval came only after the group sought help from the American Center for Law and Justice, which threatened a lawsuit against the IRS, Gerritson said. Although some of the groups were explicitly labeled “tea party” or “patriot,” others that came under intense scrutiny were focused on challenging the Affordable Care Act — known by many as Obamacare — or the integrity of federal elections. In a June 3, 2011, letter to the IRS, Mitchell questioned the agency’s motivations for delaying recognition of one of her clients who had filed nearly two years earlier, writing, “Is the [group’s] opposition to Obamacare and the takeover of America’s healthcare system by the government the reason that this application has been held up and not approved?” Catherine Engelbrecht, president of the Houston-based True the Vote, first filed for tax-exempt status in July 2010. At one point, Engelbrecht — who is still awaiting a determination from the IRS regarding her voting rights organization and a separate tea party group, King Street Patriots — said an IRS employee informed her: “I’m just doing what Washington is telling me to do. I’m just asking what they want me to ask.” The IRS did not respond to requests for comment Monday.
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Maybe it's just me, but somehow I'm forgetting the part about where George W. Bush got impeached because the IRS investigated liberals under his watch. That doesn't mean we should ignore what happened under President Obama, but Rove's baseless hyperventilating is a reminder to keep things in perspective.
Wow. You Obama apologists are still bringing up Bush? "Bush did it too" is kind of irrelevant given that Obama's in his second term. It's about time to be accountable, don't you think?
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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I know you got your pitch forks out, but before you light those torches let's remember;
IRS targeted church for speaking out against White House two days before the president's reelection
Karl Rove speaking on Fox Monday morning about what would have happened if the IRS had targeted liberals for scrutiny during the Bush administration:
We'd have every major liberal newspaper in America calling for investigation ending in impeachment. It'd be leading the evening news. We'd have have every group that had liberal or progressive tendencies demanding answers and marching on the White House. And leaders of Congress, Democrats in Congress, demanding to have answers. It'd be a nightmare at the Bush White House had this been done on our watch.
Poor Republicans. Always the victim of hypocritical liberals. Except:
Stepping up its probe of allegedly improper campaigning by churches, the Internal Revenue Service on Friday ordered a liberal Pasadena parish to turn over all the documents and e-mails it produced during the 2004 election year with references to political candidates.
All Saints Episcopal Church and its rector, the Rev. Ed Bacon, have until Sept. 29 to present the sermons, newsletters and electronic communications.
The IRS investigation was triggered by an antiwar sermon delivered by its former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, at the church two days before the 2004 presidential election. The summons even requests utility bills to establish costs associated with hosting Regas' speech. Bacon was ordered to testify before IRS officials Oct. 11.
Maybe it's just me, but somehow I'm forgetting the part about where George W. Bush got impeached because the IRS investigated liberals under his watch. That doesn't mean we should ignore what happened under President Obama, but Rove's baseless hyperventilating is a reminder to keep things in perspective. Of course, with Darrell Issa in charge of the House Government Oversight committee, fat chance of that happening.
So, then you are saying that you completely approve, 100%, of everything that Bush did, correct?
You support Bush?
Browns is the Browns
... there goes Joe Thomas, the best there ever was in this game.
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Just clicking
This falls under the heading of FWIW. to those that hate Obama, this will get laughed at, to those that support him, they will say, see, he didn't have any thing to do with it.
Take your pick
Or people will read/hear what he says and compare that to his stance on Benghazi...and conclude that they can't believe a word he says if there is any chance that he might look bad from it.
Nixon lost all credibility through Watergate. Obama's transgression in Benghazi makes Watergate look like a typo.
Like I said
Like you said? Are you kidding?
Your take and mine could not possibly be more different.
With his statement: "Like I said," he was using you as "prime example number one" of the prediction he made. You know- the one about which type of person would treat the post in an agenda-driven manner.
...and since you were the very first person to do so, you earned the title. In other words- you made his point.
Congratulations.
"too many notes, not enough music-"
#GMStong
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It's really ironic since Nixon is the reason we have established "-gate" as a suffix which means scandal... we now have Benghazigate and IRSgate...
Most presidents since Nixon have had to weather some type of '-gate'.
A lot have been tied to things far more egregious than Nixon and Watergate. But the reason that's the one that shook the walls down is that they had Nixon.
If you can pin the tail on the donkey, so to speak, then you've got something '-gate'-;like in terms of potentially shaking up the executive branch.
But if it can be pinned to an appointee or something along those lines, then usually the '-gate' just becomes a controversy, and that's pretty easy to do in a bureaucracy.
Nixon shot himself in the foot by recording his office.
This IRS this is a long-shot to an impossibility as far as getting evidence of Obama's involvement.
The Benghazi issue is another story. It probably won't take him down, but there's more of a chance that he could be pinned on something.
But you still need a smoking gun, and that's a tough thing to get, especially against such a powerful and guarded institution.
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If in the summer I take a cold shower that doesn't equate with hating hot water, but I am willing to recognize that all politicians end up in hot water eventually. Am I to assume you completely approve of profiling Tea Party organizations? Besides isn't the person who was in charge get the job during the previous administration? My only point being that this may only be political in the sense that Tea Party organizations have often attacked the IRS, they have a tax exempt status, and they were profiled. 
Last edited by rockdogg; 05/14/13 06:08 AM.
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My only point being that this may only be political in the sense that Tea Party organizations have often attacked the IRS, they have a tax exempt status, and they were profiled.
Only?
You don't find that by itself alarming?
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With his statement: "Like I said," he was using you as "prime example number one" of the prediction he made. You know- the one about which type of person would treat the post in an agenda-driven manner.
...and since you were the very first person to do so, you earned the title. In other words- you made his point.
Congratulations.
Thank you for setting the board rules that the first to respond to another post is somehow guilty as charged and someone with a different opinion is agenda-based in their response.
His point was simply that people who "dislike Obama" will think he did wrong in Benghazi primarily because they dislike Obama. Which is BS.
My point is that people just might think Obama did wrong in Benghazi based on thought, research and consideration of what we've been told.
Maybe...just maybe...people don't like Obama's policies and actions because they don't like his policies and actions. Why must YOU conclude and declare that there is some agenda?
Your's and Daman's are the most classical type of defensive responses to ANY criticism of Obama's policies and actions. It simply CANNOT be his actual policies and actions...it simply MUST be something personal or based on some agenda. What's next? Am I a racist?
Congratulations? Really? Thank goodness we have you to set us straight.
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I find unexplainable lumps alarming. I find this highly predictable and surely more common than we know. The justice dept. is looking at phone records without warrants in the name of security. At some point, as with drones, we have to realize that sausage's taste has no relation to how it's made. I don't think bringing it up for discussion is a bad idea at all, but I think bringing it up merely to smear one party or the other is pretty much how we've gotten the govt. we deserve in the first place. And yes, I'm guilty as charged.
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Stepping up its probe of allegedly improper campaigning by churches, the Internal Revenue Service on Friday ordered a liberal Pasadena parish to turn over all the documents and e-mails it produced during the 2004 election year with references to political candidates.
All Saints Episcopal Church and its rector, the Rev. Ed Bacon, have until Sept. 29 to present the sermons, newsletters and electronic communications.
The IRS investigation was triggered by an antiwar sermon delivered by its former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, at the church two days before the 2004 presidential election. The summons even requests utility bills to establish costs associated with hosting Regas' speech. Bacon was ordered to testify before IRS officials Oct. 11.
Maybe it's just me, but somehow I'm forgetting the part about where George W. Bush got impeached because the IRS investigated liberals under his watch.
My response is going to have a number of "If's" in it so don't get alarmed...
There is a difference between targeting somebody if you have reason to believe that they have violated their tax exempt status.... and blanket auditing black churches...
Now I don't know the details behind this. The article says it was over one anti-war sermon. I find that hard to believe. But IF they had real reason to believe they had violated their tax exempt status... and IF they thought they could prove it... and IF this wasn't just about intimidation and silencing a message, then I can understand it. If it is about nothing more than silencing an opposing message, then it's equally wrong.
But I do have a question... what would the Bush administration hope to achieve by going after one black church in Pasadena 2 days before an election? Did he think that would help him win California?
Just trying to make sense of it all... 
yebat' Putin
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There's something like a 7% chance of getting audited anyway, and they're talking about a one isolated instance. There doesn't seem to be any systematic auditing of anti-war churches. The link to the article isn't working, so I can't read any further on it ... but it just sounds like a HUGE leap of faith to say one sermon triggered an audit. Is there any actual evidence that points to that being the case??
This sounds much more like a case of putting the cart before the horse. If I ever get audited, I could just say, "Well, I once said something negative about the administration on these forums ... so now they're targeting me"
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His point was simply that people who "dislike Obama" will think he did wrong in Benghazi primarily because they dislike Obama. Which is BS.
My point is that people just might think Obama did wrong in Benghazi based on thought, research and consideration of what we've been told.
Maybe...just maybe...people don't like Obama's policies and actions because they don't like his policies and actions. Why must YOU conclude and declare that there is some agenda?
This is a valid point, and one that I've made here for years.
The idea behind these suspicions and accusations is that one is coming at the issue with some form of agenda or something that prevents them from viewing things objectively.
For instance ... you can go back to the old Bush threads, and you'll find a ton of criticism of Bush, and a ton of accusations that those criticisms are coming from a biased place.
And now that Bush is long gone you can see how those attitudes held up, to an extent. A lot of those posters have now completely softened their stances and attitudes. They don't really seem to hold Barack Obama to the same standards. They tend to jump to defend him the way they accused others of doing before, etc., etc.
And you can go through them and see all sorts of criticisms of Bush that are quite valid, but coming from somewhere that are certainly agenda driven. Other times not. So you can sort of sift through and get a better picture in that regard.
You can see the shifts in 2008 when the attack dogs became eye rollers and vice versa. And you can also see some consistent opinions and concerns.
Now, with Obama... yes, it's totally warranted to be upset with Benghazi. But just having a valid reason to be concerned doesn't erase the possibility of bias.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it you who called the S.C. appointment of Sotomayor to be a travesty, as we had put a racist on the Supreme Court?
And it's not limited to you ... look around at the unfounded accusations of him being a Muslim, a Marxist, homosexual, etc., etc.
There are entirely valid reasons to be furious with Barack Obama. But simply doing so doesn't mean you're not doing so out of a desire to rather than a conclusion.
People shouldn't just assume that people don't like Obama. And even if they do, it shouldn't matter much to the debate. Just kind of ignore it and makes your points on a merit basis. Saying 'you just hate...' isn't any more of an argument than 'I hate...'
People looking to defend this administration are currently making a lot of very narrow arguments that they used to whine about.
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I find unexplainable lumps alarming.
I find this highly predictable and surely more common than we know.
Are you arguing 'they do this all the time'?
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Do you think that would be much of an argument or do you believe this is truly something new? Tuesday, May 14, 2013 12:32 PM EDT When the IRS targeted liberals While few are defending the Internal Revenue Service for targeting some 300 conservative groups, there are two critical pieces of context missing from the conventional wisdom on the “scandal.” First, at least from what we know so far, the groups were not targeted in a political vendetta — but rather were executing a makeshift enforcement test (an ugly one, mind you) for IRS employees tasked with separating political groups not allowed to claim tax-exempt status, from bona fide social welfare organizations. Employees are given almost zero official guidance on how to do that, so they went after Tea Party groups because those seemed like they might be political. Keep in mind, the commissioner of the IRS at the time was a Bush appointee. The second is that while this is the first time this kind of thing has become a national scandal, it’s not the first time such activity has occurred. “I wish there was more GOP interest when I raised the same issue during the Bush administration, where they audited a progressive church in my district in what look liked a very selective way,” California Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff said on MSNBC Monday. “I found only one Republican, [North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones], that would join me in calling for an investigation during the Bush administration. I’m glad now that the GOP has found interest in this issue and it ought to be a bipartisan concern.” The well-known church, All Saints Episcopal in Pasadena, became a bit of a cause célèbre on the left after the IRS threatened to revoke the church’s tax-exempt status over an anti-Iraq War sermon the Sunday before the 2004 election. “Jesus [would say], ‘Mr. President, your doctrine of preemptive war is a failed doctrine,’” rector George Regas said from the dais. The church, which said progressive activism was in its “DNA,” hired a powerful Washington lawyer and enlisted the help of Schiff, who met with the commissioner of the IRS twice and called for a Government Accountability Office investigation, saying the IRS audit violated the First Amendment and was unduly targeting a political opponent of the Bush administration. “My client is very concerned that the close coordination undertaken by the IRS allowed partisan political concerns to direct the course of the All Saints examination,” church attorney Marcus Owens, who is widely considered one of the country’s leading experts on this area of the law, said at the time. In 2007, the IRS closed the case, decreeing that the church violated rules preventing political intervention, but it did not revoke its nonprofit status. And while All Saints came under the gun, conservative churches across the country were helping to mobilize voters for Bush with little oversight. In 2006, citing the precedent of All Saints, “a group of religious leaders accused the Internal Revenue Service yesterday of playing politics by ignoring its complaint that two large churches in Ohio are engaging in what it says are political activities, in violation of the tax code,” the New York Times reported at the time. The churches essentially campaigned for a Republican gubernatorial candidate, they alleged, and even flew him on one of their planes. Meanwhile, Citizens for Ethics in Washington filed two ethics complaints against a church in Minnesota. “You know we can’t publicly endorse as a church and would not for any candidate, but I can tell you personally that I’m going to vote for Michele Bachmann,” pastor Mac Hammond of the Living Word Christian Center in Minnesota said in 2006 before welcoming her to the church. The IRS opened an audit into the church, but it went nowhere after the church appealed the audit on a technicality. And it wasn’t just churches. In 2004, the IRS went after the NAACP, auditing the nation’s oldest civil rights group after its chairman criticized President Bush for being the first sitting president since Herbert Hoover not to address the organization. “They are saying if you criticize the president we are going to take your tax exemption away from you,” then-chairman Julian Bond said. “It’s pretty obvious that the complainant was someone who doesn’t believe George Bush should be criticized, and it’s obvious of their response that the IRS believes this, too.” In a letter to the IRS, Democratic Reps. Charles Rangel, Pete Stark and John Conyers wrote: “It is obvious that the timing of this IRS examination is nothing more than an effort to intimidate the members of the NAACP, and the communities the organization represents, in their get-out-the-vote effort nationwide.” Then, in 2006, the Wall Street Journal broke the story of a how a little-known pressure group called Public Interest Watch — which received 97 percent of its funds from Exxon Mobile one year — managed to get the IRS to open an investigation into Greenpeace. Greenpeace had labeled Exxon Mobil the “No. 1 climate criminal.” The IRS acknowledged its audit was initiated by Public Interest Watch and threatened to revoke Greenpeace’s tax-exempt status, but closed the investigation three months later. As the Journal reporter, Steve Stecklow, later said in an interview, “This comes against a backdrop where a number of conservative groups have been attacking nonprofits and NGOs over their tax-exempt status. There have been hearings on Capitol Hill. There have been a number of conservative groups in Washington who have been quite critical.” Indeed, the year before that, the Senate held a hearing on nonprofits’ political activity. Republican Sen. Charles Grassley, the then-chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said the IRS needed better enforcement, but also “legislative changes” to better define the lines between politics and social welfare, since they had not been updated in “a generation.” Unfortunately, neither Congress nor the IRS has defined 501(c)4′s sufficiently to this day, leaving the door open for IRS auditors to make up their own, discriminatory rules. Those cases mostly involved 501(c)3 organizations, which live in a different section of the tax code for real charities like hospitals and schools. The rules are much stronger and better developed for (c)3′s, in part because they’ve been around longer. But with “social welfare” (c)4 groups, the kind of political activity we saw in 2010 and 2012 is so unprecedented that you get cases like Emerge America, a progressive nonprofit that trains Democratic female candidates for public office. The group has chapters across the country, but in 2011, chapters in Massachusetts, Maine and Nevada were denied 501(c)4 tax-exempt status. Leaders called the situation “bizarre” because in the five years Nevada had waited for approval, the Kentucky chapter was approved, only for the other three to be denied. A former IRS official told the New York Times that probably meant the applications were sent to different offices, which use slightly different standards. Different offices within the same organization that are supposed to impose the exact same rules in a consistent manner have such uneven conceptions of where to draw the line at a political group, that they can approve one organization and then deny its twin in a different state. All of these stories suggest that while concern with the IRS posture toward conservative groups now may be merited, to fully understand the situation requires a bit of context and history. So although I think this is wrong I have a problem with the idea that all of these sins against conservatives are some new form of government mind control exerted by Obama.
The problem is that if you have been blaming him for everything from day one then how do you recognize truly scandalous activities?
What I find humorous though is how conservatives now have the ACLU on their side.
The world is ending!!!!
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What I find humorous though is how conservatives now have the ACLU on their side
What I find humorous are the Obama lovers still playing the "well, Bush did it too" card deep into his second term.
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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Well don't confuse it with a "Bush did it too" card, even though he did, realize that it's insincere outrage. You either hold both equally scandalous or you toe the party line. Seems to be a whole lot of toes toeing the line on this one. I've stated that Obama is just as political as any politician and I've stated that politics is filled with this throughout history. What get's me is the selective outrage and willingness to jokingly refer to any of these screw ups as historically more significant than any other political screw up. The point is people become predictable and unbelievable when they state everything this guy has done is "the worst". What happens when "the worst" actually happens? It could be Obama, but it might be the other party. Then what? That was the worst, but this is even more worse, but wait til tomorrow when worser still happens, only to be followed by the really, really bad!
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With his statement: "Like I said," he was using you as "prime example number one" of the prediction he made. You know- the one about which type of person would treat the post in an agenda-driven manner.
...and since you were the very first person to do so, you earned the title. In other words- you made his point.
Congratulations.
Thank you for setting the board rules that the first to respond to another post is somehow guilty as charged and someone with a different opinion is agenda-based in their response.
His point was simply that people who "dislike Obama" will think he did wrong in Benghazi primarily because they dislike Obama. Which is BS.
My point is that people just might think Obama did wrong in Benghazi based on thought, research and consideration of what we've been told.
Maybe...just maybe...people don't like Obama's policies and actions because they don't like his policies and actions. Why must YOU conclude and declare that there is some agenda?
Your's and Daman's are the most classical type of defensive responses to ANY criticism of Obama's policies and actions. It simply CANNOT be his actual policies and actions...it simply MUST be something personal or based on some agenda. What's next? Am I a racist?
Congratulations? Really? Thank goodness we have you to set us straight.
I bolded this one sentence to make a point to you. You make a lot of assumptions about me that aren't grounded in a single thing I said. You've called me an "apologist"... and directly linked me (in ideology) with Daman....
when all I did was give you some help with reading comprehension. You said you didn't understand his remark, and that you two couldn't be farther apart. My only comment addressed that, and that alone. I did not defend him in any way, I didn't agree with him in any way... and I damn sure didn't apologize for Obama in any way.
Go back and re-read my post.
As for the rest of your screed, might I suggest that you wait until after I've actually posted about the subject, before assuming I have ANY opinion about it at all?
Thanks in advance.
"too many notes, not enough music-"
#GMStong
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What you're failing to acknowledge (I'll give you that you weren't here during the latter part of the Bush years) is that many of the conservatives here voiced their displeasure with Bush and the republican party. Any time someone criticizes Obama, you jump in with a "Bush did it too" and "where's the outrage at Bush". Obama's in office now, and he's accountable for his actions. Bush is 6 years gone, he's not in office anymore....in other words, irrelevant.
Obama himself set the table by promising to run "the most transparent administration" of all time, and you're upset that we're calling him out for his closed door meetings, cover ups and deceit? He promised to change the status quo, and you're jumping to his defense because "Bush did it too".
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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I'm not looking to defend his argument, because I don't quite get it, but to be fair, during Bush's tenure conservatives/Republicans on the board were doing a lot of Clinton/Democrat comparisons.
It's a cyclical thing.
As for all of this ... Jon Stewart had a nice little quote, calling all of this "removing the last arrow in [Obama's] pro-governance quiver: Skepticism about your opponents."
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I know it would be unfair to expect you to have read everyone of my posts on this board or the other, but I have often labeled myself as guilty as charged when it comes to political intention. What I haven't learned about you yet is if you have ever criticized any other party or haven't consistently used the "there you go blaming Bush again, you Obama lover" card. I will put effort into figuring out if it's all that important.
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I was livid with Bush and the republican party for supporting the initial bailout and their stances on immigration and free trade. I was very outspoken against McCain and Romney, and didn't vote for either. I quit the republican party in 2008. I am pretty much fed up with our political system which rewards those that are born into politics and have no idea what it's like to work for a living.....and make their fortunes through political connections. I'm a fairly strict constitutionalist. I strongly favor term limits.
Obama's in office now, and that's where I'm directing my ire at the current state of our government.
And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.
- John Muir
#GMSTRONG
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Your's and Daman's are the most classical type of defensive responses to ANY criticism of Obama's policies and actions....
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I bolded this one sentence to make a point to you. You make a lot of assumptions about me that aren't grounded in a single thing I said. You've called me an "apologist"... and directly linked me (in ideology) with Daman....
So my bolded comment above equates to calling you an "apologist"? I am referring to one particular defense of Obama...and that is that if one dislikes his policies and actions it simply cannot be due to his ACTUAL policies and actions. It MUST be due to some other reason and such applies to anyone who thinks as I do.
You aren't apologizing for Obama...you are agreeing with Daman's point and concluding that I dislike his policies and actions because of some issue outside of his policies and actions.
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when all I did was give you some help with reading comprehension. You said you didn't understand his remark, and that you two couldn't be farther apart.
Well...thanks for the help with my reading comprehension  I understood exactly what Daman was saying...and my POINT is that his take and my take on the matter could not be more different.
It IS possible to dislike one's policies and actions based on something other than personal dislike and some magical agenda.
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My only comment addressed that, and that alone. I did not defend him in any way, I didn't agree with him in any way... and I damn sure didn't apologize for Obama in any way.
Maybe I need help HERE with reading comprehension. Your post - in my mind - was an affirmation of Daman's post which is that I must either hate Obama or have an agenda as I apparently proved to you by being the first to respond to Daman's post. You were much closer to agreeing with Daman (which is fine by me) and stereo-typing those who disagree with Obama than I ever got to actually calling YOU an apologist (apologist is a word YOU keep using...not me.)
I'm not accusing you of defending Obama, I am accusing you of indicting me for my opinions on Obama as being due to personal dislike or agenda.
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Go back and re-read my post.
Whatever...that is a two way street.
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As for the rest of your screed, might I suggest that you wait until after I've actually posted about the subject, before assuming I have ANY opinion about it at all?
Wait a minute...I must need more help with reading comprehension. Daman made a post about the type of person who dislikes Obama - or likes Obama - and how that choice will determine whether they think something Obama had done was a 'big deal' or not.
I replied with my disagreement to that opinion. You responded accusing me of being exactly the guy Daman was referring-to.
You posted your opinion about my retort to Daman's post. You basically 'called me out' with your guilty verdict and accused me of being exactly what Daman said is the characteristic of anyone who dislikes Obama's policies and actions.
Yet I am supposed to wait until you respond to some other post before I respond to you?
Clem, YOU responded to ME.
I bolded that one sentence to make a point to you.
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Thanks in advance.
You are welcome...in advance.
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Just clicking
This falls under the heading of FWIW. to those that hate Obama, this will get laughed at, to those that support him, they will say, see, he didn't have any thing to do with it.
Take your pick
Or people will read/hear what he says and compare that to his stance on Benghazi...and conclude that they can't believe a word he says if there is any chance that he might look bad from it.
Nixon lost all credibility through Watergate. Obama's transgression in Benghazi makes Watergate look like a typo.
Like I said
Like you said? Are you kidding?
Your take and mine could not possibly be more different.
Yeah, like I said if you hate Obama and everything he stands for, anything, big or small that happens becomes the next "Big Mistake"
Conversely, if you feel that Obama is a good president, then you are going to look at it differently.
Despite what you may or may not think, I wasn't knocking you for your beliefs.. hell, believe whatever you want, no skin off my back. I was just pointing out that I was correct in my assumption of what different people might think of it..
Which by the way, is why I wrote,, FWIW.
Guess you missed that point..
#GMSTRONG
“Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.”
Daniel Patrick Moynahan
"Alternative facts hurt us all. Think before you blindly believe."
Damanshot
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Maybe it's just me, but somehow I'm forgetting the part about where George W. Bush got impeached because the IRS investigated liberals under his watch. That doesn't mean we should ignore what happened under President Obama, but Rove's baseless hyperventilating is a reminder to keep things in perspective.
Wow. You Obama apologists are still bringing up Bush? "Bush did it too" is kind of irrelevant given that Obama's in his second term. It's about time to be accountable, don't you think?
Ha,, that's funny. as if to say, Bush didn't do it!
Seems to me that whenever anyone brings up that Bush did it also, or Clinton did it also or Nixon did it also, what they are really saying (if you can put you personal bias aside) is that it's not the first time.. That Obama isn't much different then those that came before him.
it's not necessarily an attack on Bush or any previous president. It really is nothing more than, "what, you think this is the first time it's happened"? kinda thing.
But it's the old saying, wooh to he who hides another mans candle in order to make his own appear brighter.
#GMSTRONG
“Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.”
Daniel Patrick Moynahan
"Alternative facts hurt us all. Think before you blindly believe."
Damanshot
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Forums DawgTalk Everything Else... IRS apologizes for targeting
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